For Jen Kraus Rosen, it started in the eighth grade with an invitation from a friend to a BBYO Shabbat dinner. Jen had grown up in a non-Jewish area of Virginia, and the invitation was one of few opportunities she had to experience the warmth and familiarity of Jewish traditions in the company of peers. What happened in the years...
If you make a left turn out of Hymie's Deli in Merion, and head about 25 yards west on Montgomery Avenue, you will come to a building marked "Philadelphia Community Kollel." If you walk inside, almost any hour of the day or night, you will find Jews, often in groups of two (chavrusa), studying Jewish law. The participants are not...
Circumcision, or brit milah, has long been the stuff of cheap jokes and comedy. But in recent weeks, what used to be nothing more than harmless fare has taken on a much more serious tone. So-called "intactivists" on the fringe left of American politics have pushed the radical notion that infant circumcision is an act of genital mutilation, so unacceptable...
On May 24th, I had the privilege of attending Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's rousing address before a joint session of Congress. It was an event that was personally significant both as an American and as a legislator. I was moved by the prime minister's words of strength in the face of the persistent danger that Israel faces. It made me...
As a government official in several administrations, an American and a Jew, I see Israel from multiple perspectives. Israel plays a strategic role in advancing American interests in the Middle East; Israel and the United States share a common set of democratic values; Israel is the Third Jewish Commonwealth, returning the Jewish people to their homeland after 2,000 years of...
Sivan 13, 5773
